Amicable social interactions can enhance fitness in many species, have negligible consequences for some, and reduce fitness in others. For yellow-bellied marmots (Marmota flaviventris), a facultatively social rodent species with demonstrable costs of social relationships during the active season, the effects of sociality on overwinter survival have yet to be fully investigated. Here, we explore...

Predators exert strong top-down pressure on herbivorous insects, but research on how predators affect herbivore fitness often focuses on the more active juvenile and adult life stages while ignoring the pupal or cocoon life stage. Few studies have investigated predation of lepidopteran pupae or cocoons and even fewer have investigated species that are not forest pests. Here we present a study o...

Milkfish, Chanos chanos, is one of the major inland cultured fish species in Taiwan. Variations land resources and climate have led to application two distinct culture practices milkfish polycultures with white shrimp, Penaeus indicus. This study applies a translog cost function model analyze production scale economy input demand price elasticity four polyculture systems different periods (OWC ...

The European honey bee (Apis mellifera) is a highly valuable, semi-free-ranging managed agricultural species. While the number of managed hives has been increasing, declines in overwinter survival, and the onset of colony collapse disorder in 2006, precipitated a large amount of research on bees' health in an effort to isolate the causative factors. A workshop was convened during which bee expe...

The movements of meadow voles in a field popUlation were studied using radiotelemetry during fall and winter. The voles changed from a dispersed, solitary dispersion pattern during early autumn to social clusters with communal nesting during winter. This shift occurred as the daily median temperature approached freezing. Movement was inhibited and localized during winter, except under snow when...

The effectiveness of Architect, SE growth regulator (mepiquat chloride, 150 g/l + pyraclostrobin, 100 prohexadione-calcium, 25 g/l) in winter rapeseed var. Vitovt and Mazari Mercedes hybrids is shown. application the preparation phase 4–5 leaves at rate 1,5 l/ha reduces height growing point by 47,7–55,2 %, increases diameter root crown on average 13,5–22,8 crop overwinter survival 3,7–12,3 % oi...

Body size may influence both adult fecundity and the probability of survival through each life stage. Previous studies of burying beetles (Nicrophorus, Coleoptera: Silphidae) have revealed reproductive advantages for larger adults and the role of parental care in determining larval size and number. In this study I measure the effect of size on survival over the winter period and the correlation...

1. Supplementary winter feeding of game animals, and particularly deer, is a common practice throughout northern (continental) Europe and parts of North America. Feeding is normally associated with maintaining high densities of animals for hunting, in terms of: (i) maintaining or increasing body weights and condition overwinter; (ii) improving reproductive performance and fertility; (iii) incre...